Two new books on intelligence — Intercept by Gordon Corera and Why Spy? by Brian Stewart and Samantha Newbery — find that had Britain been less hidebound by secrecy it could have led the world in computer science

This is an interesting document, and a pretty bad novel. I don’t know why anyone thought it would be otherwise. In 1960, Harper Lee published To Kill a Mockingbird. It was an important statement, as well as a very good… Read more

Wednesday Martin’s Primates of Park Avenue mocks New York’s high-maintenance ‘mommies’ who worry sleeplessly over money, infidelity and dieting. But they are a much stranger breed than this memoir makes out

According to Zero Zero Zero by Roberto Saviano and Dreamland by Sam Quinones, the flow of Class A drugs around the world is now unstoppable, and traffickers have grown increasingly violent. If only the trade were regulated, all this could change

This hefty volume is misleadingly titled. It is not an escapist sort of travel book, ushering the visitor around the homelands and houses of the Italian literati. It is a selection of the author’s previous literary articles, mostly book reviews… Read more